Innholdsfortegnelse for August 2025 i VolksWorld

From the outside looking in, Marcel Galima has it all. Not only does he live in Lakewood, southern California, but he’s also a stay-at-home dad. Perhaps more importantly for us VW guys and girls, he has a choice of air-cooled VWs to drive every day. That includes the Bus shown here, an insanely detailed ’63 Karmann Ghia convertible (a previous cover star on VolksWorld) and a cool, lowered, patinated Type 34 Razor Edge Ghia on detailed Fuchs. From that intro, you know Marcel is no newcomer to VWs, and the story of how he got into them begins with his father. You see, when Marcel was young, his dad owned a ’69 Karmann Ghia. He parked it a few years before Marcel learned to drive and Marcel always thought he’d…

To this day, Split Window Buses are associated with the 1960s, more specifically the tail end of that decade when hippies were in. Ironically, these same Transporters have also suffered from a certain stigma attached to that image. While many of us would not be caught dead wearing bell bottoms and a tie-dye t-shirt, as VW fans we look at the hippy era with a certain element of nostalgia, even if many of us weren’t actually alive during its heyday. In the years since, VW Buses have gone from being affordable mass transport for all to highly collectible icons in the automotive world, fuelled in no small part by enthusiasts with memories of the Buses they owned during the halcyon 1960s. So Cal resident, Dan Ray, is one of them.…

The picture on the previous page is, of course, an homage to the one of Richard ‘El Ritchie’ King’s ’65 Karmann Ghia Cabriolet that appeared in Colin Burnham’s Air-Cooled Volkswagens book all those years ago. Back then, Ritchie was the man to know and through his shop, German Car Company, turned Southend on Sea, Essex into the beating heart of the UK’s new wave Cal Look scene. A hot rodder at heart, with a flair for all things cool, Ritchie was always up to something, and his penchant for Karmann Ghias led to the construction of some of the coolest cars on the scene. You may remember his louvred yellow coupé, or the pale blue one with the lift-off hard top, but it was his Guards Red ’65 Cabriolet, with…

'Mag'-style' GTV IIs New from EMPI are these neat 'mag'-style' GTV II rims, which make a refreshing change from the familiar black 'n' polished BRM replicas. Available in two widths (5 x 15 and 6.5 x 15-inch), they're ideal for a staggered fitment on any 5 x 205 PCD VW. Either run the matt bronze finish as it is, or detail them up a bit to stand out in a crowd. Valve stems are included, but you need to order the correct mounting hardware separately (p/no. 00-9711-0 for bolts or 70-2870-0 for nuts). CNC-machined, billet aluminium GTV II centre caps are sold seperately, ordered p/no. 10-1127-0 for silver, or p/no. 10-1129-0 for black. From: Contact your local EMPI dealer and quote p/no. 10-1126-0 (15 x 5-inch) or 10-1125-0 (15 x…

In 2017, I sold my grey Type 34 Karmann Ghia. As I watched it drive away, a wave of regret hit me. I knew I’d need to find another project, something to fill the void. Not long after, my friend Jason Weiler, along with Ross Wolfe, mentioned he had a 1964 Type 34 Ghia. He told me it was partially assembled and had what you might call a ‘street driver’ paint job. It sounded perfect. I wasn’t looking to build another full-blown show car, I just wanted something I could assemble and cruise without stressing over every stone chip. Having given it some thought, I convinced myself I had the time to take the car on. I always do. That was in September 2021. The car sat in my garage…

There are plenty of car build stories that begin with a cheeky classified ad, but not so many of them snowball quite as far as this one. What started as a casual inquiry about a set of wheels turned into a 12-year restoration mission, culminating in one of the best turned out Type 147s on the planet. The man behind the madness is Rich DeWitte of Las Vegas, Nevada. A long-time VW aficionado with a driveway full of VWs. That alone should tell you Rich isn’t exactly new to the scene. He’s owned more air-cooled treasures than he can count, and currently has five Volkswagens in his fleet, each in varying degrees of completion, though none are quite as special to him as his 1970 Fridolin. For those not fully…

“I din’t think it needed that much work,” says Alex about the ’68 Beetle you see here. His brother-in-law bought it in 2012, and it looked like a fairly solid car, but we all know how that can go. Aged 23 now, Alex has been involved in the VW scene since he was about seven years old. His parents owned a ’73 1303 in the 1980s, and his uncle and cousins also had Beetles, so the whole family would attend VW shows together in his formative years. His dad ended up buying a ’68 Beetle and they restored it together; that’s where Alex’s journey with air-cooled VW ownership really began. Now, we should point out here that Alex’s dad, Andrew, is an ace welder / fabricator and builds pressure-tested vessels…

Ask any parent of a toddler and they’ll tell you kids know what they like. Be it food, favourite toys, colours and even sometimes people. For Andi Santoso, a 39-year-old VW enthusiast from Yogyakarta, Indonesia, his two-year-old son, Kenizio, has already nailed it. Whenever it’s time for a drive and Andi gives him a choice of vehicles, there’s only one answer: “The blue one.” That blue one is, of course, this 1975 Beetle, built in the classic California Look style. But it’s more than just a head turner out on the streets, this car is a rolling example of how the Cal Look ethos has travelled the world, adapting, evolving and, thanks to enthusiasts like Andi, continuing to thrive like almost no other facet of the VW hobby. Like that…

From time to time, I receive a package in the post from a good friend in The Netherlands. He has a nice collection of VW toys and asks if I would be interested in working on them to bring them back to life. In the most recent package was an old plastic Arnold Split Window VW and a Geobra coin bank, both made in Germany in the early 1950s. The German toy firm by the name of Karl Arnold GmbH was in business from 1906 to 1965, primarily manufacturing toys and games in the Nuremberg area. To the delight of vintage VW toy collectors worldwide, the Arnold GmbH product line introduced during the early 1950s included a large, 1/18 scale (weighing in it an impressive 215mm / 8.3in long) plastic…